Key Difference: Sony has recently announced its revamped smartphone and tablets line. Along with the new flagship phone Sony Xperia Z, the company has also added a new tablet, the Sony Xperia Z Tab. The tablet supports a 10.1 inch TFT capacitive touchscreen and is created using the Sony Mobile BRAVIA Engine 2 technology. iPads have the screen size of 9.7 inches with multi-touch display. iPads are intended as devices for a multimedia experience, reading e-books, watching movies, listening to music, playing games, browsing the Internet, or retrieving e-mail. The company is currently on the iPad fourth-generation, also known as just plain iPad or iPad 4.

A little while back we only used mobiles. The latest trends were smartphones, such as an iPhone or a Blackberry. Then, Apple launched the iPad, a new device that led to the rise of tablets. Tablets are somewhat of a cross between smartphones and laptops. They became popular as laptop replacements. They allowed users to carry smaller and lightweight objects for basic purposes of gaming, surfing, chatting, etc.  There are varieties of new tablets that are being launched to allow easier connectivity on the go. They are many tablets that also border between smartpones and laptops, which enable users to use the tablet for calling purposes; these are known as phablets (phone + tablets).

Tablets are mainly used for multimedia, watching videos, reading e-books, and surfing the internet. They feature a full virtual keyboard which is useful for online chatting, social networking and sending emails. Tablets also tend to have dual cameras, which can be used to take pictures, while the front facing camera can be used for video chatting and video calling. Basically, tablets are like a mini computer. They are able to perform most tasks that one uses a laptop for, such as surf the net, take pictures, chat with friends, send and receive emails, as well as use it as an e-Book reader. One can also use a tablet for basic computing functions, watching videos and listening to MP3 songs on the internet. Also, tablets are much more portable and lightweight than most laptops, notebooks or netbooks.

Sony has recently announced its revamped smartphone and tablets line. Along with the new flagship phone Sony Xperia Z, the company has also added a new tablet, the Sony Xperia Z Tab. It shares many features to its little brother, but is also different in many ways. The Xperia Z tab has already seen the light of day in Japan in January, while it was recently unwrapped for global availability. The company’s claims the tablet to the lightest and the slimmest LTE tablet available in the market. The tablet supports a 10.1 inch TFT capacitive touchscreen and is created using the Sony Mobile BRAVIA Engine 2 technology. Similar to its little brother, the phone is water-resistant and dust proof. The phone can be submerged about 1 meter for 30 minutes without any damage (However, all the ports and slots should be firmly closed). The phone can also withstand water jets and the screen is coated with shatter-proof film coating. The borders of the tablet have been designed in a way to not obstruct side viewing.

The tablet houses the 1.5 GHz Krait Quad-core processor and the Qualcomm Snapdragon APQ8064 chipset. The tablet runs on 4.1.2 Jelly Bean and can be upgraded to 4.2 Jelly Bean. It is available with 16/32 GB internal memory, which can further be upgraded up to 64 GB. The company has maintained the camera technology on the tablet. The tablet houses 8.1 MP Exmor R primary camera and a 2.1 MP secondary camera for video chatting. The phone offers features such as Superior Auto, geo-tagging, Exmor R for mobile image sensor, HDR for both picture/film, continue burst mode, scene recognition, sweep panorama, smile detection, face detection and touch focus.  Superior Auto automatically adjusts the shooting profile depending on the shot that is being taken. Additional features include face unlock, screenshot capturing, wake-up mode, screen mirroring, throw feature, TV side view and remote control application. The throw feature allows users to automatically connect and play mobile content on any devices that can be connected to the phone via screen mirroring, DLNA or Bluetooth. Face Unlock allows users to place their face in front of their phones to unlock the photo. The company has not yet announced pricing of the tablet.

Apple originally launched iPad in 2010. Its launch started a new trend for tablets. iPad is a type of tablet PC, which was originally promoted as a cross between an Apple iPhone and iPod Touch with added capabilities of computing. However, it is not meant to be a replacement for desktop personal computers or laptops. iPads have computational properties that can do some tasks as laptops but not all. The company is currently on the iPad fourth-generation, also known as just plain iPad or iPad 4.

iPads have the screen size of 9.7 inches with multi-touch display, that provides approximately 264 pp density. The screen has a scratch-resistant glass and an oleophobic coating that keeps fingerprints on the screen and the back. iPads are intended as devices for a multimedia experience, reading e-books, watching movies, listening to music, playing games, browsing the Internet, or retrieving e-mail. It has a software structure more like that of a mobile phone. It also has a very simple user interface, which can even be easily operated by children. iPads are available with a memory capacity of 16 GB, 32 GB, 64 GB and 128 GB.

The device runs on 1.4 GHz dual-core processor and has a 1GB RAM. The iPad has been called the best iPad of all the four generations. The iPad is powered by the new Apple A6X chipset. The device has a 5MP rear camera for taking photos and a 1.2MP front camera for video calling capability. The camera also has video recording capability and can record 1080p@30fps and has video stabilization. The iPad has a 42.5-watt non-removable lithium-polymer battery. The iPad is available in models supporting only Wi-Fi, or 3G and Wi-Fi. However, iPad lacks Flash, software that a number of websites use to display content. So, iPad cannot load these pages. This limits the web surfing experience. The fourth-gen iPad is similar to its predecessors, while it still has two minor and one major upgrade on it. The 30-pin connector has been upgraded to a smaller Lightning connector, while the front camera has been upgraded to the HD Status. The major upgrade is the new A6X processor that replaced the A5X processor on the third-gen.

The information for the detailed table about the two tablets has been taken from Sony Mobile website, Apple website, and GSMArena.com.

Image Courtesy: sonymobile.com, pluggedin.co.uk